Routine activities may suddenly become confusing.
A person may struggle to:
Use a familiar appliance
Drive to a familiar location
Prepare a meal they have made many times
Use a phone or remote control
Follow the rules of a familiar game
This can be one of the more noticeable early changes because the task itself is not new.
4. Confusion About Time or Place
People with early dementia may lose track of:
Dates
Seasons
Passage of time
Where they are
How they arrived somewhere
Forgetting the day briefly can happen to anyone, but repeatedly becoming disoriented in familiar surroundings is more concerning.
5. Problems With Words and Conversation
Dementia can affect language.
A person may:
Struggle to find common words
Lose track of a conversation
Repeat themselves
Call familiar objects by the wrong name
Stop in the middle of a sentence and not know how to continue
Occasional word-finding difficulty is common with age, but frequent communication problems deserve attention.
6. Misplacing Things and Being Unable to Retrace Steps
Everyone misplaces keys or glasses sometimes.
A person with dementia may place objects in unusual locations, such as:
Keys in the refrigerator
A wallet in a kitchen cabinet
A phone in a laundry basket
They may then be unable to retrace their steps to find the item.
Some people may also accuse others of stealing things they actually misplaced.
7. Poor Judgment or Unusual Decisions
